


Autotomy

by brokenlittleboy



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Hurt Sam Winchester, Hurt/Comfort, Id Fic, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, Post-Hell, Protective Dean Winchester, Sacrilege, Unrequited Love, mentions of assault
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-01
Updated: 2017-01-01
Packaged: 2018-09-14 01:30:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9150832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brokenlittleboy/pseuds/brokenlittleboy
Summary: God granted Dean a miracle but God forgot to tell Dean about it.Another take on post-Hell Sam, through Dean's eyes.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Autotomy- the casting off of a limb or other part of the body by an animal under threat, such as a lizard.

Sam sits silently, a docile wisp of a human being, less than a shadow of the boy he used to be. 

 

Dean tries not to be hurt by it anymore, tries not to let the memories he cherishes of Sam from years ago burn fiercely in his chest, but it’s fucking hard. Every single day is the same. It doesn’t get any better, and it certainly doesn’t get any easier.

 

Nothing has ever made him feel so disheartened. Maybe his heart is lying, maybe his senses have gone dull, but this feels so much worse than Lucifer, than yellow-eyes, than the brutal, abrupt loss of their father. He’s already lost Sam several times. He’s lost him again when he’s sitting right fucking here.

 

God gave Dean the miracle of his brother but God forget to tell him about it because God’s a piece of shit. God left a drooling mess of a little brother on the streets to be manipulated and abused until local police finally intervened and Sam was moved to a home for specialized care, which he received very fucking little of. Hardly a step up from where he’d been before, lollygagging around with drug addicts and liars. 

 

Dean only found him when Cas finally fucking decided to show up, over a year after Dean began repeatedly praying for the bastard. He gets Heaven’s fucked, shit’s got him busy, yeah, but Dean had assumed- maybe incorrectly- that they were friends. Yet nothing. Nothing until Castiel popped in unannounced, grabbed Dean by the arm, and popped him over to goddamn Nebraska where Sam was an emaciated vegetable left to sit in a pile of his own piss all damn day long.

 

So now they’re here, together, at Bobby’s. At first, even with the new duties of cleaning, bathing, and feeding Sam, it was incredible. Just to see him again. To witness him breathing. To feel him warm. To watch him sleep. To smell him. Yeah, it’s a bit creepy from the outside, sue him. Dean was stolen of everything of Sam and to get it back--it was overwhelming. It’s not like Dean hasn’t wiped Sam’s ass before, either, or used a towel to remove food from his face. Dean’s changed Sam and put him to bed, even after he was a baby. Hunts royally fucked both of them up on multiple occasions. Hell, Sam’s wiped Dean’s ass just as many times as Dean wiped his.

 

Whatever. Dean does not want to dwell on that shit, pun fucking unintended. 

 

He just wants Sammy back.

 

He’s grown tired of spoon-feeding him and listening to him moan in animalistic, subhuman, pure terror every single night. There’s no other way to say it. The ragged noises are suffering uncontained, uncensored, inhumane. Sam never dreams unless it’s terror. Sam never eats unless Dean’s shoving it down his gullet, and anything over a fucking handful has him vomiting back up sooner or later.

 

He’s been brought back to life but he’s not alive, and it seems like soon enough his body will force its way right back to death. Dean just doesn’t get the point. This is no miracle, no gift, no act of a merciful god. This is hell, torture, pain. He doesn’t want it.

 

One time in an anguished bout of depression, further fueled by Johnny Walker raided from Bobby’s cabinet, Dean put his pistol to Sam’s temple and flicked the safety off. Sam didn’t even flinch. He didn’t blink, glazed eyes staring uncomprehendingly at the middle distance.

 

Dean put his finger on the trigger then slammed the gun immediately down, rearing away from it. He got in the Impala and drove, leaving Sam alone, blaring Zeppelin and sobbing his god damn eyes out. 

 

Another time he fantasized about smothering Sam with a pillow in his sleep. It would be so simple and it would be over so soon.

 

But Dean’s beginning to think that these thoughts are selfish. He wants Sam gone, he doesn’t need him gone. He wants the burden to disappear, he doesn’t want to see this zombie that wears Sam’s face any longer. It’s like his soul is gone. His spirit. His anything. Dean doesn’t want it.

 

But it’s not his choice to make, and he knows that, he really does, despite all the drunken and intrusive thoughts. So he keeps going. He quietly suffers, mindlessly continuing on, mouth curving in a bitter smile when he realizes he and Sam actually have that much in common.

 

At night is when his own soul is truly laid bare. At night he is even more selfish than the Dean that aches to end Sam’s (and his own) misery. At night, after tenderly stripping Sam to a t-shirt and worn boxers, Dean curls around his brother and holds him close. He pretends they’re both okay, down at Bobby’s for holiday, sane and healed and perfectly at peace. He pretends Sam is dozing lightly in his arms, that he chose to be there and Dean bitched and moaned about the girly cuddling.

 

He pretends further than reality on harder nights. He pretends Sam curls into him and presses his lips to Dean’s throat by choice, that they found their way to an exhausted but content sleep together after countless kisses and sensual touches, seeking comfort in each other’s presence and bodies. 

 

It’s a horrible putrid awful fantasy and he knows it. It has been the central and desperately hidden source of his self-hatred ever since he hit puberty. Thank god Sam is- was- oblivious to those things. Sam was a smart aleck, alright, Sam was bright and sharp, but his own shortcomings and self-loathing barred him from ever even slightly perceiving the true depth of Dean’s feelings.

 

It’s all screwed up, basically. Before this, before hell, both of them were already screwed up seven ways from Sunday.

 

Dean still prays, but not to Cas. Not anymore. He prays to God and cusses him out. He prays to God and apologizes. He prays to God and asks for forgiveness. He prays to God and begs for Sam to either be made better or to find permanent peace. As much as Dean hates losing him and is so sorely wanting to, Heaven is the perfect place for Sam, made for him, honestly. He’s not at his chair of honor at the dinner table and maybe he should be.

 

He prays just as much as Sam used to, but in a less pure and well-meaning way than Sam, he’s sure. Selfish, selfish, selfish. That’s all Dean is these days.

 

Maybe that’s all he ever was and it only took this satire of Sam Winchester to bring the ugly truth out.

 

One day Dean’s digging eggs outta the fridge to stuff down Sam’s gullet when a light feeling presses between his shoulder blades. He almost freaks the fuck out right then and there but holds it together, shoving the eggs onto the counter and whipping around wide-eyed to see what’s gone on and if Sam’s okay.

 

Yeah, he seems to be okay. More than okay. His hand is still outstretched from where it had prodded at Dean, his eyes glued to Dean’s. Truly glued. Truly looking, wet and bright. Maybe not ticking all the way, his brain may still be booting up, but no longer close to comatose.

 

“Sammy?” Dean chokes out, throat full. “Sam, is that you?”

 

Sam bites his lip, blinking slowly, eyes like a child’s. He takes a hesitant step forward, adam’s apple bobbing, and curls his baby bird arms around Dean’s body in slow motion.

 

Dean hugs him back, letting out a long breath, close to a sob. He squeezes his eyes shut tight and grips Sam tighter when the edginess leaves Sam’s limbs and Sam melts into Dean’s embrace, pressing his nose to the crook of Dean’s neck.

 

“S’okay,” Dean rasps, rubbing his hands up and down Sam’s back. “I don’t know--hell, I don’t know anything, but it’s gonna be okay, we’re gonna keep working for it, I promise.”

 

Dean pulls back and Sam meets his eyes, looking cowed and innocent like a doe at the end of a rifle, so not Sam but so goddamn Sam, fuck fuck fuck, Dean’s brain is telling him two things at once.

 

“I love you,” Dean says, very gravely, for fear this is all a cosmic joke and he may never get another fucking chance. 

 

Sam nods like a rusted robot and makes his way back to the table in a loping, elderly gait.

 

Dean watches, entranced. Sam looks at the carton of eggs. Sam looks at Dean. Sam looks at the eggs.

  
Dean makes them breakfast.

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was written and edited in under thirty minutes total as part of a personal challenge/break my lazy streak because why the fuck not, right? Happy New Year.
> 
> I have this unrelenting obsession with post-Hell Sam and even writing my 2015 bigbang with the lovely Cris (Quickreaver) didn't satiate it. I just keep going. The same but different thing over and over. I'm having fun doing it, though, and that's all that matters, right?
> 
> Thanks for reading this little id splurge. Comments and thoughts welcome. I hope everyone's New Year brings creativity and opportunity in sweeping bounds. I really appreciate you guys.
> 
> ~Coyote


End file.
